Elemental
by glitter and razzmatazz
Summary: New minds for molding arrive at Elemental Prep School, the most elite boarding academy in the modern world. But these new minds bring an explosive clash of personalities so great that sometimes the Spirits wish they could wear earplugs. High school AU. / One: Of demon ladies, departing trains, deserts, and dumb people—Katara, Sokka, Zuko, Jet, Toph.


a/n: I've always wanted to take a crack at a modern high school AU. But only recently I started brainstorming ideas. It wasn't until I re-watched "The Headband" school scenes that this show really got on the road. But I also wanted to do something that wouldn't be super-cliché. So in place of a public high school or university, it's a selective boarding school instead. You can just imagine the shenanigans.

Additionally, this is the first time I have attempted a chaptered fic in a while. I think it'll end up more of a oneshot/drabble collection within the universe, but I'll see how it goes. I'll try to update as often as I can.

Also, I'm always looking for constructive criticism/reviews. I really appreciate them. I'll try to address questions and concerns as quickly as possible, too!

Thanks—and by golly, I'll get to the actual story.

* * *

[**elemental**]

_I. Of demon ladies, departing trains, deserts, and dumb people_

* * *

As the afternoon creeps over Elemental Preparatory School, located just outside the bustling metropolis of Ba Sing Se, the three towers on campus cast a sprawling shadow over the main quadrangle, and—Sokka decided as he cocked his head to the left exactly ten degrees—it eerily resembled the head of an ugly rhinoceros beetle, three horns jutting out, awkward, jagged, perilous spikes.

But he had to shake the thought from his mind just as quickly as it came. He didn't believe in omens much the way he didn't believe in magic or the Tooth Fairy or Aesop's fables and their ludicrous morals. He wasn't a fan of beetles so much either—he found their leg mechanics unnatural and nearly sickening. Thus, he never participated in the dismemberment of various insects in the pre-K sandbox as a toddler, and he was often ostracized by his peers.

It's not like now-seventeen-year-old Sokka was still bitter about his so-called "friends" preventing him from usage of the curly slide on the playground during recess. No. Of course not. Sokka didn't hold grudges. Why would you think such a heinous thing. Geez oh whiz.

He forced his short attention span back to reality. Along with his "baby" sister, sixteen year old Katara, and his father, Hakoda, he gazed back and forth about the campus with wide, excited, and only a little intimidated eyes. There was spongy green grass and skinny deciduous trees—maple, oak, elm—surrounding him before the regal, red-brick buildings with English Ivy twisting up and down the sides. Each building had a heavy white door in its entrance with locks that only released when a student flashed his or her ID card in the scanner. The buildings were all labeled with signs—and when Sokka squinted, he discovered that half of the buildings were called "Beifong Hall" or "Beifong House" or "Beifong Auditorium" or some variation of the same surname. Few structures seemed to identify by any other name.

"Rick folk," Sokka muttered under his breath, suddenly concerned that even in his stained polo shirt and stained blue tie he was still too underdressed to stand on the campus green. He fidgeted with the oppressive collar of the fanciest clothing he owned.

Hakoda heard him, always the alert father. "You think?" He laughed heartily. "Make plenty of friends. When they invite you two to their mansion homes, bring me along, too. And then marry those friends if you can. I'd never have to work another day in my life. And I could drive a Mercedes."

"I wouldn't mind a rich girl," Sokka replied dreamily. "But not one of those surgically enhanced nightmares I see on E! all the time…"

"You watch E!, Sokka?" Katara interrupted, a sly grin on her face.

"No. No! Did I say 'all the time'? I meant—"

"Besides, I'll give all the girls plenty of warning before you start parading about in their dorms with your ridiculous manly-man act," she said, running a hand over the intricate braid down her back. She wore a blue lace sundress—the nicest one she had—that she found on sale at the K-Mart for twelve dollars.

"It's not an act," Sokka held. "I _am _a manly-man. One hundred percent manly-man."

"Every time you grow an inch of facial hair, you turn into your alter ego. What's his name?"

"Okay, I do _not_—"

"Wang Fire! That's it!"

"Katara, you are being a seriously flaming b—!"

"Enough!" Hakoda interjected exasperatedly, a hand flying to each of children's agitated shoulders. "Behave, you two. You're both on scholarship. Act like it. You know, _refined_ and such."

Katara smirked devilishly. "I think that tree is more refined in a branch than Sokka is."

"You know," Sokka pouted, "your words hurt sometimes."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

Hakoda sighed, momentarily cursing the lapse of judgment he had all those years ago in which he believed having children was a brilliant idea. Babies were sort of cute, sure, but teenagers were a heaping mess of not-cute-at-any-time-whatsoever-and-frankly-mostly-annoying. As he contemplated, the unconventional family climbed the stone steps, approaching the admissions office as the bell tower atop Beifong Chapel rang three in the afternoon.

* * *

Zuko loved train stations.

He liked being able to lose himself in the crowd, to become part of a pack of ordinary people. He adored the idea of transforming into someone unremarkable and wholly unimpressive. He could pull the hood of his jacket over his head, push his bangs out of his eyes, and go about his business through the hustle-and-bustle of commuters and tourists, pushing his suitcases and duffel bag in a small cart on his way to the coach car. It wouldn't be a tremendously long ride from Yu Dao airport to the small station near Serpant's Pass. No more than three hours. He could find a quiet compartment and relax.

He flashed his ticket to the attendant outside the fifteenth car and then heaved his luggage into the storage shelves by the sliding doors, carrying only his iPhone with its cheesy flame decals his Uncle bought for him to his seat. He settled himself into the lonely four-seater, leaning back in his seat with his feet resting on the seat across from him. He gazed out the window at the businessmen with their briefcases and the young families with their shrilly screaming infants milling about from train to train amid the shrieking of air brakes on old locomotives that needed oiling and the hiss of stalling engines.

"All aboard!" was the cry of the conductor. Zuko could hear him through the thick Plexiglas window. The train lurched as its brakes were released and the vehicle began to accelerate forward.

He opened Angry Birds on his phone and was about to play when a loud rap on his door made him jump. His phone slipped between his fingers and slid between the seat cushions to the floor. The volume was at full-blast and he could hear the absurd sound effects of oinking pigs, reminding him that his game was over. He cursed loudly.

"Is anyone in these seats?"

Zuko fished for his phone before looking up.

The voice belonged to a kind-faced teenaged girl with light brown hair and big curious chocolate eyes. She stood in the hallway with another girl of similar age. Her friend grinned pleasantly and waved at him. Neither was exceptionally beautiful, but they were nice to look at.

Zuko, still journeying through his strange adolescence, answered eloquently. "Uh…uh…um…okay."

"Great!" The girl swung her braid over her shoulder and stuffed a small messenger bag in the overhead container, plopping herself into the seat next to him; her friend chose the seat across from her and rested her leather purse in her lap.

"I'm Song, by the way," the girl introduced herself unabashedly. "And this is Jin."

"Hi," Jin said, shyly.

"Hi," Zuko replied.

"Sorry to inconvenience you like this. We bought our tickets late and it was either sit with you or in a compartment with this weird man who was sucking on various fruits and vegetables, and we decided you looked friendlier and also much less crazy," Song said cheerfully. "So as long as you aren't an axe murderer or anything, it'll all work out. Where are you heading?"

"Uh…" Zuko hesitated. "Ba Sing Se outskirts."

Her grin widened, showing plenty of her Chiclet-white teeth. "That's where we're going."

"You're not a student, are you?" Jin wondered.

"I'm going to Elemental," Zuko managed, quickly this time, but it unfortunately came out sounding more like a question.

"We're classmates then! You must be new. What's your name?"

His eyes widened at the prospect of being recognized. With the umbrage of his hood hiding his facial scars so well, he thought he could melt into the background and remain there contentedly. He had to think on his feet.

"Lee," he blurted out, the first thing he thought of. "I'm Lee. I'm from Yu Dao."

"Nice to meet you, Lee," Song said, warmly. "Elemental's a really wonderful place. I'm sure you'll like it."

* * *

There was dust, and dust in that dust, and dust on top of dust, and more dust just so that dust wasn't lonely. There was likely more dust than air, more dust than anything else. A suffocating amount of dust. Every time Jet took a step beside the highway through the desert, he was greeted with a mouthful of it, the speeding eighteen wheelers exacerbating the whole situation. He sputtered, and the sun beat down on his back. The piece of grass he had been chewing on wilted. The weight of his luggage, a camping backpack with pajamas, three outfits, his toothbrush and toothpaste, sports cleats, socks, shin guards, a sweatshirt, and a canteen for water, bore down on him more and more as time passed.

He was sweaty and sunburned and he didn't know how much longer he could do this.

Cars whizzed to and fro along the road, and the signs read that Ba Sing Se was another fifteen miles away. His shoulders slumped.

"Why the hell was this a good idea, again?"

He set down his backpack and perched on top of it, taking a load off his weary legs. He weeded through it until he found his canteen, opened it. To his horror, it was empty, and he hazily recalled finishing the last some six miles ago.

"_Shit_."

He was left with few other options. In the blazing heat and dust upon dust, he raised his thumb into the air patiently and was, for the most part, ignored for the next ten minutes. In the distance, he could've sworn he saw water.

* * *

Toph Beifong didn't need perfect vision to know when she was faced with total bullshit.

"I told you, Dad," she insisted, ripping her scrawny arm away from her father's vice-like grip, hissing faintly as his nails scratched over her skin. "I don't need help."

"But the doctors were adamant that—"

"I don't need it! I'm only half-blind. I can take care of myself. I'm not some fragile, little daffodil!" she grumbled.

"You're half-sighted," her father corrected.

"_Excuse me?"_

"The doctor says that you aren't half-_blind. _You're half-_sighted._"

"Well, gee. That sure puts the cherry on top of the optimism cake, huh?"

"Don't get snippy with me, young lady," he scolded, to which Toph sighed loudly and harshly and leaned back into the leather passenger seat of her father's spick-and-span Rolls Royce. She tried to think about their destination in place of how much she detested having a no-nonsense, overprotective fun-sponge of a parent in her general vicinity.

The pair was speeding down the newly constructed Earth Kingdom beltway on their way to Ba Sing Se. Toph was on her way back to what she deemed the ultimate purgatory—prep school. And it only made matters worse that she was entering as a freshman, aka "fresh meat." Her middle school years had gone badly enough—not only had she been deemed the tiny blind kid, the outcast at lunch hour, but her teachers determined that she was "disruptive" in class, nearly a "total wild child."

Luckily, the previous year hadn't been wholly unbearable—she managed to befriend most of the wrestling team, winning them over when she ventured into their weight room on a September afternoon and announced that she wanted to be buff and beat up all the snot-nosed brats in her year. They took her in as a little sister, invited her to all of their matches, confronted all of the bullies who pushed her around, taught her confidence, to stand up for herself and never back down, and even offered her the occasional cigarette at team parties. She nicknamed her favorites of the group—Hippo, the Boulder, Pipsqueak—and learned how to flatten her opponents at their weekly practices.

But most of those wrestlers were seniors, and she wouldn't have the option of hiding in their team room anymore. She'd have to get around on her own now.

She tried to suppress the butterflies that fluttered about aimlessly in her stomach to no avail. For some reason, the confidence she nurtured that summer was slowly escaping her. The prospect of being on her own was terrifying, but she knew there was no getting out of it; she'd have to face it sooner or later, so she might as well get it done sooner.

She sat through the rest of the car ride with her cheek pressed against the cool glass of the car window, bumping along with the car on uneven surfaces. Before long, when she was thoroughly enraptured by her own far away daydreams, her father pulled into the parking lot at Elemental Prep School and turned to his daughter seriously.

"You don't have to do this, Toph. We spend a lot of money, sure, but if you feel at all uncomfortable here, your mother would be happy to home-school you—"

"Dad, I'll be fine," Toph dismissed with a wave of her hand.

"If I hear about you getting into any trouble this year, I'm coming here to get you. Do you understand? There will be no arguments."

Glumly, Toph acquiesced. "Yeah, I get it."

"And you're sure you don't want a seeing-eye dog?"

Toph didn't feel the need to flatter the question with a response. She shoved the car door open, hopped out, and yanked her trunk out of the backseat.

Her father joined her, placing an arm on both of her thin shoulders. "You know, Poppy and I worry so much about you."

"You don't need to."

Toph tried to pull away, but her father's arms didn't budge.

"Promise me you'll stay safe."

"Yes, Dad. Whatever."

And with that, she tugged herself away, turned on her heels, and lugged her belongings to the girls' dormitory.

* * *

"Names please."

The admissions office receptionist reminded Katara of the DMV employee who had overseen her driving test—completely disinterested, thoroughly exhausted, and entirely unwilling to put up with people's crap. She wasted no time in addressing the woman's question with a response.

"I'm Katara, and this is my brother, Sokka. We're new students."

"_Fascinating_," the woman replied half-heartedly, entering the information into her computer. She stared at the screen for a while, then rubbed her temples exasperatedly, and mumbled several obscenities under her breath. She tapped her long, fake fingernails on her wooden desk and rolled her eyes.

"Goddamn computer."

After about a minute, the computer finally spit out the guidance she needed, and she glanced up at Katara. "You're the scholarship students?"

"Yes!" Sokka snapped, as though it was obvious. Katara elbowed him in the gut and jutted her chin out as though to harangue him for his rudeness.

"That's us," Katara said.

"From the Southern Reservation?"

"Yes."

The woman made a huffy noise and printed out a few sheets of paper, stapled two separate packets, and handed one to each sibling. "Read through these. If you do it properly, you shouldn't have any questions," she said in a bored voice, before craning her next around Katara and calling out, "Next!"

Katara dragged her grumbling brother out of the crowded office, rejoined her father who had been waiting outside on a bench, and the three sauntered back down the path to their car.

"The nerve of that woman," Sokka seethed once Katara let go of his arm. "Where I'm from has absolutely _nothing_ to do with how qualified I am to attend a school. _Nothing!_"

"Maybe she was surprised to see us," Katara suggested, trying to smooth over her brother's quick temper. "I bet they don't get many kids from the tribes, right?"

Hakoda perked his ears up. "What did she say about us?"

"She basically told us we were too stupid to have scholarships," Sokka snarled.

"She did _not_ say that—"

"She implied it, Katara!" Sokka cried. "She implied it. She didn't believe us at first, but I'm sure if we were rich pale kids from Ba Sing Se or from the big cities in the West, we wouldn't have to deal with all of this flagrant bull-crap."

"You're just being paranoid," Katara said, frowning. "And it doesn't matter now. She's just an office worker. I doubt you'll see her again."

"Exactly! She's _just _an office worker! Now what are the important people going to say? 'Wow, Sokka, are you really from a reservation? You seem too smart for that!'"

"Calm down, Sokka. It wasn't a big deal!"

"Yes, it was!"

"It wasn't!"

"It was!"

"Both of you need to settle down," Hakoda said, firmly. Both of his children complied. Hakoda had his "last-straw" face on, and if they weren't careful, he would start using his outdoor voice, and everyone within a ten mile radius would be able to hear him yelling.

In silence, they continued to the Ford Taurus.

* * *

Song and Jin had insisted not only on following Zuko off the train and into the school, but also into his dorm room, giggling obnoxiously the whole way, and grinding his nerves down to the bone. They were perched on his mattress (he hadn't bothered to put sheets on the bed yet) as he fiddled about with his suitcase and hung his pants up in the closet.

By some miracle, he had managed to hide his facial scars the entire time. His hood stayed over his face, covering shaggy, dark hair that plastered over an angry, red burn over the skin of his left eye.

"So you're an athlete, Lee?" Jin said, spying a soccer uniform peeking out of his duffel bag.

He reluctantly nodded, tossing the bag under the bed and out of sight.

"I heard the team is going to be great this year," Song gushed. "They, like, recruited all over the world and brought in all kinds of kids from all over. Amazing players."

"Yeah," Zuko replied, pathetically.

"Don't want to lose the national title again, right? Last year sure was a nail-biter."

"I _know_. I was there," Zuko said, irritably.

Awkward silence followed. Jin and Song both stared at Zuko with what he could only describe as "googly-eyes."

But all of a sudden the door swung open and he was saved by a tall, busy-haired kid in a trucker hat who reeked of cigarette smoke and diesel fuel.

"Hey roomie," Jet greeted, before staggering over to the room's sink, shoving his face under the faucet, and gulping down enough water to constitute a small lake. Then, he wiped off his face on his dirty sleeve, tossed his trucker hat onto the desk beside Zuko's bed, flopped himself face-down onto the floor, and mumbled into the carpet, "I've got a story for you, man, but I'm gonna take a nap first."

Jin and Song watched the new kid, faces lit up in shock and confusion, and Zuko continued to root through his belongings, brainstorming on ways to shoo the gaggle of girls off his mattress, out of his room, and eventually into some sort of soundproof space with a door he could lock from the outside.

Later in the school year, he would look back on the event and determine that he really should've called campus life immediately and requested himself a new roommate on the spot. It would've saved him quite a bit of trouble in the long run.

* * *

Toph squinted at the packet that her father tucked into her backpack for ten minutes before finally giving in and tracing her fingers over the Braille lettering instead.

"Blah, blah, yakkidy-yak, yaaaawn…"

It was all rules and regulations that made her feel like a pig locked up in a miniscule pen. She wanted to run free! After all, she spent all of her summer months in doctors' offices or under the scrutinizing eyes of her hovering parents; she didn't want to be confined here as well.

As her fingers traveled down the paper, she finally found a passage she appreciated.

"No roommate?" She pumped her fist in the air. "I'm going to have so much more room for activities!"

And she bounded off down the dormitory hallway, card key in hand.

* * *

Katara had informed Hakoda that she was just going to drop her things off into her room and make her bed before running back down and saying goodbye for the next few months. She had already carefully paged through the packet she received from the admissions officer (or "demon lady," as Sokka referred to her), because the only thing she liked more than tormenting her older brother was rules. And now she was scurrying through the fifth floor hallway of the girls' dormitory in search of her room.

The girls' and boys' dorm buildings were identical, each seven stories tall with seven spacious rooms on each floor—some singles, some doubles. Each room had its own bathroom. It had a mahogany desk, a four-poster bed, a sturdy wooden bookshelf, a tall set of drawers, and a sliding-door closet for each of its occupants. The rooms all had internet, cable, and telephone capabilities.

In the center of each floor was a common room—a lounge of sorts, complete with a couch and several matching recliners, a long coffee table, a fireplace, a flat-screen television, a projector screen aimed at the far white wall, a study table with six chairs around it, and a coffee machine. Each floor was called a different color—the bottom floor was red and the walls were painted a bright scarlet. The color pattern went up through the floors in rainbow order—orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet on the seventh floor.

Katara admired the soft azure shade of the walls around her, decorated in a wave design. It reminded her of home in a way—the Southern Reservation was nearly engulfed by water; she used to ease herself to sleep listening to the calming ebb and flow of the ocean outside her window…especially when nights grew cold and she missed her mother so badly that it ached to her core…

She was in a new place. And first things first, she had to become acquainted with her new roommate.

She unlocked the door and cautiously pushed it open, afraid she would frighten her living partner. Katara was unnerved at the prospect of a poor first impression. If she would have to be near a person for the next year, she would start their relationship on a good note.

"Hello?" Katara offered.

"Hey," was the reply. "Come on in. Make yourself at home."

Katara dumped her stuff onto the floor and swung the door shut behind her, hearing the click of the electronic lock. She gazed about her room.

The far side of the room was a mess of green—posters were pasted haphazardly about the walls, fans hanging crookedly over the headboard, luggage spilled over the floor in trunks bearing the Earth Kingdom logo and another symbol Katara didn't recognize. The bedspread was a patchwork quilt of various shades of emerald, sewn together at odd angles, but it was thick, and Katara figured it was warm. The bathroom light was left on, and Katara noticed a clutter of makeup scattered around the sink area—creams and blushes and eyeliners and mascaras and eye shadows.

It took her a while to locate a girl in the midst of the jade parade. She was tall and athletic looking, dressed in an olive tunic and jeans, and as such, she blended right in to her eccentric surroundings. She had short, mousy brown hair that she wore half-up into a pony tail and half down, not quite reaching her broad shoulders. She wore a sincere smile.

"I'm Suki," she said. "I'm a little messy though. I hope you don't mind."

"It's totally fine," Katara replied earnestly. "I'm used to sharing a room with my brother, and believe me, this is nothing compared to the pigsty he leaves behind…"

Suki gave a tiny laugh.

"Oh! I'm Katara, by the way," she added as an afterthought.

"It's nice to meet you."

"And you."

Katara unzipped her linens bag and retrieved her bed sheets. "It's pretty green in here," she said before she could stop herself.

"Yeah. I guess it's a little chunk of home. I'm from Kyoshi Island, and everything there is green, so I am too by extension." Suki offered an apologetic look.

Katara unrolled her sapphire duvet, snapped it in the air to vanquish any wrinkles, and smirked. "Let's see if we can't make it turquoise in here."

* * *

The men waited patiently for their third female member, but soon enough, Katara came sprinting down the hill, hightailing it straight into her father's waiting arms.

"Everything's going to be great here, Dad. I'm going to miss you so much."

"I know, honey. I'll miss you, too."

He hugged her tightly and sadly, as though he never wanted to let her get away from him, but he finally relented. "Remember to lay off your brother. He's a nice kid underneath all the hormones and sarcasm."

"_Hey!_" Sokka protested, but Hakoda pulled him into a hug too.

"And you be nice to your sister."

"She makes it pretty tough," Sokka said, to which Katara stuck out her tongue. "But I'll try."

Hakoda turned to leave, but hesitated a moment.

"One more thing."

"Yeah, Dad?"

"Don't let anyone get you down. We're from the Southern Tribe—they don't make 'em any tougher, do they? People who tear you apart aren't worth your time. Remember that," he said, beaming at each of them. "And remember this too—I am _so_ proud of each of you. And also, if you forget to write me, I'm sending demon lady after you, okay? Goodbye."

Hakoda waved at both of his children as they returned to their dormitories and disappeared through the thresholds into the heavy, brick-laden buildings. With misty eyes, he unlocked his rusting car, pulled out of the parking lot, and turned south.

* * *

_to be continued._

* * *

a/n2: Hope you enjoyed it and the not-so-subtle Stepbrothers reference that I couldn't resist putting in. I think that Katara, Sokka, Toph, Zuko, and Jet will be the main characters, but Suki, Song, and Jin will be here too-and everyone's favorite monk will make an appearance next chapter. Keep on the lookout for other big characters too who will be making brief (or not-so-brief) appearances.

This is a modern AU. There is no bending, but the characters may have tendencies that are related to their particular element. The map is exactly the same, but cities have skyscrapers and indoor plumbing and whatnot. I've toyed with the idea that Katara and Sokka are from a sort of reservation in place of the south pole - somewhere the government set aside as "asylum," but is really anything but. Since there is no war (in Ba Sing Se) in this universe, I would imagine that conflict stems from elsewhere, and thus the racism was born. Since Katara, Hakoda and Sokka have put up with it all their lives, they're used to it, but Sokka has the biggest temper, especially when people are dismissive of it.

Demon lady is pretty much a different take on the ticket lady for the Ba Sing Se ferry who Iroh charms into giving out free tickets.

I know Jet's little vignette is weird - more on it later. It's a little idea that randomly poked into my head one time.

Zuko is a little fed up with what I like to call the "zuko stalkers club" (Jin, Song, Jet). He's never happy. What else is new. You'll see later why he hates being recognized.

And I think that covers that. Thank you, readers! You're awesome.


End file.
